The Breakthrough Spy Cameras At The Republican Convention Could Be Coming To A City Near You

Who watches the watchers? In the case of the 2012 Republican
National Convention in Tampa, that would be
27-year-old Jon Gales.

The local web developer noticed workers on cherry pickers
installing high definition CCTV cameras downtown, and so
decided to map them via a website, which can also be used as
a stand-alone iOS application.

RNCCTV provides a geographic tag
for each of the cameras installed -- which include some 90
units, 63 of which have pan/tilt capabilities and a
20x optical zoom -- as well as an estimated range of
observation for each of the devices.

According to Tampa’s request for proposal, information from which
is provided by RNCCTV, the multi-million dollar vendor
contract with Miami-based Aware Digital includes a generous
spread of surveillance technology and the inclusion of
software monitoring designed to identify “abnormal
behavior.” What software is specifically being used is not
disclosed, though the proposed contract called
for functionality matching that of BRS Labs’ AISight
product.

Tools like AISight are designed to mimic the human brain’s
ability to make and associate memories -- the software
visually records objects and behaviors via video networks,
compares them to existing instances,
and determines which of these are “unusual” enough to alert
security personnel. BRS Labs calls this “artificial neural
network technology.”

The technology is pretty fascinating, and BRS Labs provides
several case scenarios to demonstrate the level of
situational awareness that a CCTV network linked to AISight
can provide. In the scenario entitled
“Rear Access Building 6B” (video is available [here] the
software generated an alert when two individuals left
unattended luggage in a populated area. While standing
luggage in a trafficked street is certainly not an unusual
occurrence, the software determined that the luggage itself
was placed too far away from a vehicle -- this, it
determined, was a red flag that something might be amiss.

Similar demonstrations of the software, such as one entitled
“Public Access
PTZ Position 4,” can be triggered by situations such as
individuals walking up to secure facilities on vehicle-only
roadways, or trucks backing up to a an entrance door where
the usual procedure might be to drive forward around a
driveway.

As for Gales’ project to map out
his city’s surveillance camera, a spokeswoman for
Tampa’s police department stated that they are fine with it:
“the locations are not a secret.” Gales for one states
that he received no response from either Tampa’s mayor, city
council representative, or the police department when he
attempted to inquire about the surveillance cameras the
latter only issued a response once contacted by the
media.

Footage recorded by the CCTV system could be stored for four
years, beginning on August 5th and running through September
1st. The money for the project comes from a $50 million
federal convention security grant -- based on information
available at this time, it is not known what the city of
Tampa intends to do with the surveillance hardware beyond
the RNC.